Skip to navigationSkip to main contentSkip to right columnADVERTISEMENTBy Nick Carey and Divya RajagopalThu, June 25, 2026 at 12:02 PM GMT+2 7 min readBy Nick Carey and Divya RajagopalWUHU, China/TORONTO, June 25 - Just two weeks after Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney announced in January he would allow limited electric-vehicle imports from China, that country's biggest auto exporter, Chery, held its first meetings in Canada with car dealers.China's national champion BYD, now the world's largest EV maker, is already planning to open six dealerships in Canada, an advisory firm scouting locations for BYD told Reuters. BYD has also started compliance procedures to import two passenger cars to Canada, regulatory records show.Lotus, a luxury-sports carmaker owned by China's auto giant Geely, also plans to open a half dozen Canada dealerships this year – just to sell a few hundred cars, Lotus CEO Qingfeng said in an interview. And state-owned automaker Changan has a team working on a Canada launch, according to design chief Klaus Zyciora.These automakers' aggressive moves into Canada, detailed here for the first time, come despite the meager prospects for sales and profits here anytime soon: Canada approved imports of only 49,000 cars annually at a low tariff rate of 6.1%, rising to just 70,000 cars over five years. So there's little money in it – especially once that small pie is split many ways.But Canada offers something far more valuable: The perfect beachhead for what many industry experts view as the inevitable invasion of Chinese cars into the United States, despite current U.S. policies effectively banning them."We definitely have the idea of selling cars in the United States," Chery International president Zhang Guibing told reporters in May at the company's Wuhu headquarters. "Everyone definitely has that idea."Canada offers more than proximity to advance Chinese automakers' U.S. ambitions. Unlike Mexico, where cheaper cars rule, Canada's car market is almost identical to the United States in consumer tastes and industry regulations. Shifting to the United States later would be like "flipping a switch," said Dan Hearsch, global co-leader of consultancy AlixPartners' automotive practice."Canada is the practice run for the U.S.," says Robert Kerwal, director of automotive solutions at JD Power Canada.The only major difference is market size: 1.9 million cars sold last year in Canada, compared to more than 16 million in the United States.Chinese competition terrifies automakers in the U.S. industry who have seen their sales plunge in China, the world's largest car market, in recent years as China's subsidized, innovative industry exploded EV-and-hybrid sales. China has also emerged from nowhere to become the world's largest auto exporter, surpassing Germany, Japan, Mexico, South Korea and the United States, largely on the strength of gasoline cars displaced from China's rapidly electrifying market.Terms and Privacy PolicyEU DSA contactPrivacy & Cookie SettingsMore Info